Scientist sees the light on solar energy

James Temple

Updated 7:35 pm, Friday, January 18, 2013

Heinz Frei, the acting director of the Joint Center for Artificial Photosynthesis, demonstrates the lasers that are being used in the center's lab in Berkeley.
Photo: Mike Kepka, The Chronicle

Heinz Frei, the acting director of the Joint Center for Artificial...

Wenjun Liu, a synthetic chemist at the Joint Center for Artificial Photosynthesis works to discuss a more efficient recipe for creating synthetic photosynthesis on Wednesday January 9, 2012 in Berkeley, Calif. JCAP has entered a race to create earth friendly fuels that some day may actual combat the effects of global warming.

Photo: Mike Kepka, The Chronicle

Wenjun Liu, a synthetic chemist at the Joint Center for Artificial...

Kenny Lee, a mechanical engineer at the Joint Center for Artificial Photosynthesis produces hydrogen bubbles using a piece of platinum wire and and electric charge on Wednesday January 9, 2012 in Berkeley, Calif. JCAP has entered a race to create earth friendly fuels that some day may actual combat the effects of global warming.

Photo: Mike Kepka, The Chronicle

Kenny Lee, a mechanical engineer at the Joint Center for Artificial...

Kenny Lee, a mechanical engineer at the Joint Center for Artificial Photosynthesis holds a prototype of an artificial photosynthesis panel on Wednesday January 9, 2012 in Berkeley, Calif. JCAP has entered a race to create earth friendly fuels that some day may actual combat the effects of global warming.

Photo: Mike Kepka, The Chronicle

Kenny Lee, a mechanical engineer at the Joint Center for Artificial...

Kenny Lee, a mechanical engineer at the Joint Center for Artificial Photosynthesis uses a slow-motion video camera to analyze efficient ways to produce hydrogen on Wednesday January 9, 2012 in Berkeley, Calif. JCAP has entered a race to create earth friendly fuels that some day may actual combat the effects of global warming.

Photo: Mike Kepka, The Chronicle

Kenny Lee, a mechanical engineer at the Joint Center for Artificial...

One day in the summer of 1980, Heinz Frei was working on his postdoctoral project at UC Berkeley, when his mentor walked up to his desk in Hildebrand Hall.

George Pimentel, the late scientist whose name now adorns the chemistry lab, had just returned from a Department of Energy solar research conference. He said he was surprised that one presentation after another had focused on ultraviolet light, which represents just a tiny fraction of the energy in sunlight.

Infrared, which makes up far more of the energy reaching the Earth, had hardly earned a mention. The real potential to exploit sunlight lay in this "long" end of the light wavelength spectrum, Pimentel told Frei, yet no one seemed to be exploring the possibility.

Frei had been considering moving back to his native Switzerland. Instead, he said yes on the spot.

Without knowing it at the time, the decision would represent his first step on a long path to the development of artificial leaves, a potentially game-changing technology that can wring liquid fuels from sunlight, water and carbon dioxide.

For most of his childhood, Frei had expected to take over his parent's office supply business. But during a high school science class in his hometown of Lucerne, near Zurich, he found himself captivated by molecules.

"The fun of gaining knowledge and understanding phenomena around us, that really fired me up," he said.

Frei decided to go into chemistry rather than retail, eventually earning a doctorate at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology. He went on to win a fellowship that allowed him to pursue the postdoc work at Berkeley.

He was specifically drawn by the chemistry department's sophisticated lasers and spectrometers, which allowed him to conduct highly controlled experiments using infrared light to induce chemical reactions.

Following his conversation with Pimentel, he began research at the Calvin Lab at Lawrence Berkeley that would help lay critical foundations for artificial photosynthesis. Notably, it allowed scientists to take advantage of a wider slice of the light spectrum to trigger chemical reactions.

The words "global warming" were rarely uttered in the early 1980s. But even then, Frei suspected that filling the atmosphere with carbon dioxide was creating a growing problem for society that his research could help to address.

"I felt that we needed to ultimately make everyday chemicals and fuels from sunlight," he said. "I believed that in the long run, at some point, renewable energy would become a real issue. It took a while."